Run
by CSIsnickers101
Summary: Nick learns that sometimes you just have to run. For BrokenDaisy xx


Run

Disclaimer - I don't own CSI.

A/N: This is for BrokenDaisy. Happy Birthday! I really hope you have a good day. This is your present from me. Enjoy!

Catherine sighed as she left the interrogation room, just seconds after Sara. That probably could not have gone much worse. Their suspect would almost certainly not confess now, not after Sara had stuck her nose in. Catherine had offered to do the interview by herself, but you can't stop Sara from doing anything. She insisted she new best, that she would be fine and stay calm, merely sit and observe. She stated with confidence that Catherine wouldn't have even known she was in the room. But of course that didn't happen. Perhaps Catherine was more angry at herself for trusting Sara would stay quiet and not participate in anyway.

Sara turned around upon hearing her co-workers' sigh and rolled her eyes. "What?"

"Don't 'what' me, Sara, you know exactly what you did," Catherine said sternly. "He's not going to confess now, thanks to you."

"Oh, it's my fault?" Sara questioned, her voice beginning to get raised.

"I didn't start shouting all kinds of accusations at him, did I?" Catherine glared at her.

"Accusations? They weren't accusations, we know what he did. We know he's killed at least three people already," Sara insisted, her voice getting louder and attracting the attention of passers by.

"Yes, but now he's not going to confess," Catherine argued. "And we need him to confess seen as we can't get a warrant yet. Now he's going to walk, you did that."

"Me!? Not everything is my fault, Catherine," Sara snapped.

"This is. You really shouldn't let your personal issues get in the way of your work," Catherine stated, looking far too smug for Sara's liking.

That was when Nick decided it was time to step in before World War Three broke out right in front of him.

"Hey, hey, let's all just calm down," Nick tried.

"I am calm," Sara hissed through gritted teeth.

"Right, I need some fresh air," he announced, gently wrapping his hand around Sara's arm and tugged her slightly in the direction of the front door.

"What? Why am I coming?" Sara asked, somewhat harassed as she stumbled over her own feet as she span towards Nick.

"I need some company," Nick answered and set off down the corridor with an unhappy Sara in tow.

Once outside, the cold air hit them like a tonne of bricks and the dim early morning light was somewhat of a relief from the harsh artificial lights inside. Sara let her frustration be known to anyone who would listen as she let out the mother of all sighs, crossing her arms over her chest. She reminded Nick of a child having a tantrum after not getting her own way. Yet he couldn't deny it, she did look kinda cute when she was grumpy.

Nick gave her a look.

"What?" Sara glared back.

"You're better than that, Sara," Nick stated what he hoped Sara already knew.

Sara just shrugged a shoulder and avoided meeting his gaze.

Nick continued on regardless. "Come on, Sara, we're all on the same team here. We all want the same thing, right?"

Sara nodded somewhat reluctantly whist holding a stern stare.

"You and Catherine both want to catch your killer and you'll do that a hell of a lot easier if you two work together instead of against each other," Nick stated. "And you know I'm right."

Sara let out a small sigh of defeat and let her arms fall to her side and her glare fade into a slightly glum looking expression.

"And two great mind are better than one," he smiled.

Sara nodded in agreement.

"And the pair of you are the smartest women I know, and you need to use that to your advantage. You'll get the guy, I know you will, even if he doesn't confess," Nick insisted.

"I know we will. She just really gets to me sometimes," Sara eventually spoke up.

"That's just who you both are. Your both very head strong, opinionated women and sometimes you're not going to get along. There's always going to be friction. But sometimes you need friction to make things work," Nick smiled. "Like I need to explain that to a physics major."

"Yeah, maybe," Sara shrugged, pursing her lips to prevent a smile from forming.

"You okay now?" Nick asked, placing a hand gently down on top of her shoulder.

"Yeah… Yeah, I think so," she nodded, fidgeting slightly. "I guess I just needed some air."

"Good," he smiled. "You coming back inside?"

"Um, sure, in a second," Sara smiled weakly.

Nick gave her a wink before turning to head back inside, feeling very pleased with himself for successfully getting through to Sara. Not many people could say that. Not many people could say that Sara actually listened to them, listened to someone else for a change. He'd been so caught up in his own appraisal that he just about caught Sara out the corner of his eye making a run for it, literally.

He turned to look at the spot where Sara had once been stood and was faced with nothing. Instead all he could see was her running further and further away from him.

"Sara!" he called out after her, confusion lacing his voice.

But she was off, and it didn't look as though she was going to stop. Nick quickly checked his pockets and was frustrated to find his car keys weren't in any of them. He contemplated rushing inside to get them, pretty confident in where he'd left them last but with Sara disappearing into the distance he made the split second decision to chase after her on foot.

"Sara!" Nick called out again as he began to gain pace and slowly catch up with her.

Nick ran as if his life depended on it. What was Sara thinking? Why was she doing this? All kinds of questions formulated in his brain and he was determined to ask her them as soon as she'd stopped running. He tried to shout her name again but his lungs where too busy trying to provide his muscles with the correct volume of oxygen they needed to operate that he had nothing left to speak with. Plus the fact that his mouth was growing dryer and dryer by the second.

After a few minutes when it looked as though Sara's momentum was decreasing, Nick dug deep and used every bit of resolve he had left to catch up with her and with one final push he overtook her, turned around quickly, slowed down and put his hands up in front of him to try and gesture to Sara to stop as he got his breath back.

"Sara… Stop," he stuttered as he slowly ground to a halt.

Sara almost instantly came to a stop, searching his eyes for what he was about to say.

"What the hell are you doing?" Nick managed between heavy breaths.

"I had to run," she answered simply, struggling for breath also.

"What? What were you thinking?" he asked, bending over and placing his hands on his knees for support.

"I was thinking I needed to run," she stated, collapsing onto the grass that lay just a few yards from the road they'd just been running along side of.

"Jesus Christ, Sara," Nick exclaimed. "You could have warned me."

"You didn't need to have followed me," Sara insisted, starting to take slow, deep breaths again.

"I was going to come after you in my car but I left my keys inside," he explained. "I couldn't just let you run off like that, I had no idea what you were doing."

"Sorry," she offered a small smile.

"You really worried me for a second there," Nick continued, falling down on the ground next to her. "And I didn't even think you were going to stop."

Sara let out a small chuckle. "I didn't either."

"What happened, Sara? You seemed fine one minute, the next your running full pelt down the road," he wondered, running his hands up and down his thighs slowly.

"I just… I just needed to run. I can't explain it. I just knew that I had to run, and with an empty pavement in front of me I took the chance," she shrugged, trying to explain herself. "I'm sorry."

"You don't have to apologise, Sar, I just don't know what came over you."

"I don't know either. I guess…," Sara cut herself off. "No, never mind, it's gonna sound stupid."

"What is? Come on, you can tell me," Nick insisted, his breathing finally under control again.

"I needed to run to feel… to feel alive," Sara mumbled.

"How come?"

"I wish I knew," she shrugged. "But you can't ignore the heavy pounding of your heart, your slow and shallow breathing or the pain in your ankles and feet after you've been for a run."

"No, you definitely can't," Nick agreed.

"You feel out of breath, you feel the lactic acid build up in your muscles, you feel you're sweat glands get rid of water to try and cool you down. It's better than feeling nothing at all," Sara stated sombrely, her voice small, almost whisper-like.

"And you feel nothing?" Nick questioned, giving her a sympathetic look.

"No, I'm alright," she quickly insisted. "And I was before, I'm just saying…"

"It's okay," Nick smiled, placing a hand on her knee. "If you needed to feel something, that's okay. It's much better than feeling nothing."

There he went again, being nice to her. She knew that was his thing, that he was nice to most people but he had no idea what his niceness did to her. Sara hadn't been completely honest with him. She'd felt very alive just before she took off, when he'd placed his hand on her shoulder. And there he was doing practically the same thing again. She couldn't control the feelings that exploded inside her. She couldn't control her heart beat as it escalated like it had done when she'd been running, and she couldn't control the butterflies that erupted inside her stomach no matter how hard she tried. She couldn't quite pin point the moment that this kind of thing had started happening, but it had and she had no control over it. That was perhaps the scariest thing of all. Maybe Sara had taken off like she had to prove to herself that it wasn't just Nick that could make her feel that way. When he'd simply placed his hand on her shoulder in a kind and friendly gesture Sara's adrenaline had skyrocketed, so she ran. She ran to feel alive. But being near Nick made her feel alive just the same. And she couldn't change that. But running allowed her to clear her head and think.

"Though next time you decide to burn off some steam, let me know in advance," Nick continued.

Sara shook her head back into reality. "You didn't have to follow me, Nick."

"Sure I did, I needed to make sure you were alright," he gave her a cheesy smile.

"I'm fine. I really don't know what I was thinking. Run? I don't run. I'm not a runner. Some people are made to run and I am not one of them," Sara shook her head in despair.

"Thank God for that, I don't know how much longer I could have kept up with you," he smiled.

"Really? Even with all your gym training," Sara smirked.

"I'm not as young as I used to be," Nick insisted.

"Yet you still manage to catch up with a suspect."

"Barely," Nick added. "So if you don't mind, I'm gonna call Greg and get him to come and get us."

"We didn't run that far, did we?" Sara asked, looking over her shoulder in the direction they'd come from.

"No, but it's just easier this way," Nick stated. "For one thing you can't run away from me again."

Sara smirked at him as he took out his phone and began to dial Greg's number. Nick kept the call short and sweet, got straight to the point. He said they needed picking up not far from the lab, and Greg was more than happy to oblige, saying he was going on a coffee run anyway. It was a win win. Thankfully he hadn't asked many questions on the phone which was very odd for Greg, and perhaps odd no matter who they spoke to had they not asked a single question to explain as to why they were currently sat on the verge of the busy main road. Greg said he had to finish up running some fingerprints through the database and then he would pick them up.

"So he won't be long?" Sara asked.

"No, I shouldn't think so."

"We should probably start walking back anyway," Sara suggested. "If for no other reason than so he can see us when he gets here."

Nick slowly pushed himself up onto his knees before standing fully. He turned around and extended a hand for Sara. She gladly excepted his offer of help and allowed him to pull her to her feet. Once they were both stood, they began to head in the direction they'd come from, at a considerably slower pace.

"So, should we do this again tomorrow?" Nick asked, smirking slightly.

Sara gave him a gently shove away from her. "Don't even go there."

He gave her a innocent look as he returned the shove, though he pushed her harder than he anticipated. He supposed he momentarily forgot the extent of his own strength.

"Hey," Sara exclaimed, reaching out to push him away for the second time.

"Sara, you know I'll win," Nick insisted, smiling as he playfully gave her another shove.

Sara stumbled slightly and tried to react quickly with another nudge of her own yet she stopped short as she bent over in pain from the sudden development of cramp in her left calf. She reached her hand back to delicately rub the muscle in the back of her leg to try and relieve the tension.

At first Nick thought he'd caused her pain and instantly felt guilty but when he noticed her beginning to massage her leg he figured he was off the hook.

"You're gonna pay for that," Sara said once her the pain in her leg had subsided slightly, moving closer to him.

"Oh yeah? How?" Nick questioned, looking very smug.

Sara reached a hand out with every intention of using all her strength to shove him back. Nick, however, had other ideas and lightly grabbed her wrist before she had the chance to actually put any force behind her impending action. Her hand ended up resting on his chest. After quickly glancing at her hand, Sara looked up and made eye contact with Nick. They just stared at each other for a moment, content with the situation. It was only when Nick began to move forward that Sara finally realised what was actually happening. She threw caution to the wind and allowed herself to give in to temptation.

Greg chose to turn up at that exact moment, beeping his car horn as he pulled over, the sudden noise swiftly separating the two from their near passionate embrace.

"I'm not interrupting anything, am I?" Greg grinned, giving them both a knowing look through the wound down window.

Nick quickly cleared his throat, and chose to avoid answering his question. "Thanks for this, Greg."

"Any time," he nodded.

Nick opened the back door and held it open for Sara. "Ladies first."

Greg rolled his eyes in disbelief whilst Sara smiled and slid into the car. Maybe running off like she did hadn't been so bad after all.

Thank you for reading. Happy Birthday Bee! Please review.


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